'Swamy Army' Set To Target Embattled Ponting

Melbourne, Dec 22: More than a thousand Indian cricket fans, who call themselves the 'Swamy Army', will be out to inspire Sachin Tendulkar to his much-awaited 100th international ton and target a struggling Ricky Ponting

Melbourne, Dec 22: More than a thousand Indian cricket fans, who call themselves the 'Swamy Army', will be out to inspire Sachin Tendulkar to his much-awaited 100th international ton and target a struggling Ricky Ponting in the four-Test series starting December 26.

The group of 1400 fans, inspired by the famous 'Barmy Army' of England, was formed seven years ago and has been following the Indian team for some time now like their English counterparts who have achieved worldwide fame by travelling with their country's cricket team.

One of the group's founders, Sumit Grover, hoped that Tendulkar gets to his 100th ton in the first Test itself here.

"He should score his 100th century sometime during the series," Grover told 'The Sydney Morning Herald'.

"But we are hoping he can make it on Boxing Day. It will be a great start to the series," he said.

Grover said the army was disappointed that temperamental pacer Mitchell Johnson has been ruled out due to injury as it would have been fun to target him.

"But they have another target, former Australian skipper Ricky Ponting, who has averaged 50 only once in his past seven series," the newspaper reported.

"The Barmy Army is the benchmark of any sporting group in the world. But there are 1.2 billion of us, so we should have no trouble getting the numbers and making a bit of noise," he said.